Bible

THEODORE G. STYLIANOPOULOS

The Bible, composed of the Old and New Testaments, is a rich and diverse library of sacred writings or scriptures derived from the Jewish and Christian traditions. “Bible” (from the Greek biblos meaning “document” or “book”) points to the authority of the Bible as the book of divine revelation. “Scripture” (Greek graphe, meaning “what is written”) signifies the actual content of the books proclaiming the authoritative message of salvation – the word of God. In a process lasting nearly four centuries, the ancient church preserved, selected, and gradually formed these sacred texts into two official lists or canons of the Old and New Testaments, respectively, a significant achievement that along with the shaping of the episcopacy and creed contributed to the growth and unity of the church. In Orthodox perspective, the Bible or Holy Scripture is the supreme record of God’s revelation and therefore the standard of the church for worship, theology, spirituality, ethics, and practice.

The Bible is above all a book of God and about God – God himself being the primary author and the subject matter of the scriptures. The Bible bears testimony to who God is, what great acts of salvation God has accomplished, and what God’s revealed will for humanity is, communicated through inspired men and women “in many and various ways” (Heb. 1.1). These “ways” include words, deeds, rites, laws, visions, symbols, parables, wisdom, ethical teachings, and commandments. The overall message of the Bible is the narrative of salvation about creation, fall, covenant, prophecy, exile, redemption, and hope of final world renewal. The supreme revelation of the mys­tery of God is through the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, “the Lord of glory” (1Cor. 2.8), who constitutes the center of biblical revelation and marks the unity of the Old and New Testaments.

However, insofar as divine revelation occurred not in a vacuum but in relationship to free, willing, thinking, and acting human beings, the Bible also reflects a human and historical side which accounts for the variety of books, authors, language, style, customs, ideas, theological perspectives, numerous discrepancies in historical details, and some­times substantial differences in teaching, especially between the Old and New Testa­ments. The word of God was revealed by divine condescension (synkatabasis) to human beings who, although inspired, wrote at different times, changing cultures, and by their own degree of understanding and literary skills. The paradox of the divine and human aspects of the Bible is to some extent comparable to the mystery of the incarnation itself, the divine and human natures of Jesus Christ. Both aspects of the Bible, the divine and the human, must be taken seriously in working out a balanced dynamic view of divine revelation and of the inspiration of the Bible, in order to pass clear of the Scylla of fundamentalism and the Charybdis of historicism.

By its origins and character, the Bible is also a book of the church. The biblical message or word of God is addressed to responsive human beings and summons them to a covenant relationship and personal communion with God. Before the writing of texts, God’s revelation byword and deed was received by elect persons – leaders, priests, prophets, apostles, and others – who proclaimed God’s message to a sustained community of faith, first Israel and then also the church. It was within the ongoing life of this community of faith that the ancient oral traditions and new divine inter­ventions were celebrated, preserved, and eventually committed to writing. The com­munity of faith was always the living and discerning context of the proclamation, reception, interpretation, transmission, and application of divine revelation in both its oral and written forms. Therefore, an organic bond exists between the church and its Bible because the community of faith, itself a result of divine initiative, is an integral part of God’s revelation and stands behind the entire Bible which is shaped, transmitted, and uti­lized in various ways over the millennia by the church.

The Orthodox Church holds to the Greek Septuagint version of the Old Testament in its wider canon as the authoritative text.

The church also follows closely the presup­positions and perspectives of the church fathers in interpretation pertaining to the entire Bible. The patristic theological heri­tage is fundamentally a biblical legacy richly enshrined in the prayers, hymnology, rites, theological writings, and doctrines of the church, an achievement of astonishing theological coherence and normative value. Chief among these critical principles are the following: (1) the unity, primacy, and centrality of the Bible; (2) Christ as the decisive criterion of salvation and of the interpretation of the Old Testament; (3) the interdependence of church, Bible, and tradition; and (4) the hermeneutical role of tradition, including the living witness of the church in every age, as the final authority over disputed interpreta­tions of the Bible, expressed through ecumenical councils and the process of reception in the church, The church fathers from Justin Martyr to St. Gregory the Theologian were erudite figures, intellectually open and conversant with the cultural currents and methodo­logies of their contemporary world. For example, in their study of the Bible, they did not invent but rather adapted the gram­matical, allegorical, and typological methods of interpretation inherited from the Greek and Jewish traditions. In parallel, Orthodox scholars today countenance modern biblical studies and seek, with creative tensions, to define a genuinely Orthodox approach to biblical interpreta­tion, being both faithful to the church’s tradition and open to modern challenges and insights. The essential aim of Orthodox biblical interpretation remains the same: to give voice to the liberating and renewing witness of the scriptures, not only by explaining their contents, but also by facil­itating an encounter with the living God within the context of the life of the church and its witness to the world. SEE ALSO: Christ; Church (Orthodox Ecclesiology); Gospel; Patristics; Tradition

REFERENCES AND SUGGESTED READINGS

Allert, C. D. (2007) A High View of Scripture? The Authority of the Bible and the Formation of the New Testament Canon. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic.

Breck, J. (2001) Scripture in Tradition: The Bible and Its Interpretation in the Orthodox Church. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press. Hall, C. A. (1998) Reading Scripture with the Church Fathers. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press. Hopko, T. (1995) “The Church, the Bible, and Dogmatic Theology.” In C. E. Braaten and R. W. Jenson (eds.) Reclaiming the Bible for the Church. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, pp. 107–18.

Louth, A. (1983) Discerning the Mystery: An Essay on the Nature of Theology. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Metzger, B. M. (2001) The Bible in Translation: Ancient and English Versions. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic.

Stylianopoulos, T. G. (1997) The New Testament: An Orthodox Perspective, Vol. 1: Scripture, Tradition, Hermeneutics. Brookline, MA: Holy Cross Orthodox Press.

Stylianopoulos, T. G. (ed.) (2006) Sacred Text and Interpretation: Perspectives in Orthodox Biblical Studies. Brookline, MA: Holy Cross Orthodox Press.

Stylianopoulos, T. G. (2008) “Scripture and Tradition in the Church.” In M. Cunningham and E. Theokritoff (eds.) The Cambridge Companion to Orthodox Christian Theology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 21–34.